Before any purists get their knickers in a knot, the band is well aware that they’re not actually a bluegrass band – there’s even an open letter to “Mr Sizzlefingers” on their Facebook page which makes it clear. “That letter probably tells you how seriously we were taking this when we started, which is not very,” laughs Nugent. “We were aware that we were playing in the territory of music that could be mistaken for bluegrass, if you didn’t know what it was, so we really had to let the bluegrass people know that we knew we weren’t playing it, because that’s a very different approach to songs.
“If you’ve got four singer/songwriters and a multi-instrumentalist on the stage, it’s probably much closer to something like Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young or the Travelling Wilburys than a straight up bluegrass band. We’ve always come at it much more from the angle of being songwriters who love to get together and have a good time – five guys who can sing five part-harmony together – that’s always been my happiest place within music, that is within some shape of harmony singing.”
It’s clear that not only is this outfit is a labour of love, it’s probably also uniquely shaped by the fact that they’re all blokes. “It’s the brotherhood of five guys just getting together to play some of the music that they love – it does have football team-like qualities though. Everyone sticks their elbows out and gets into the music.”
Oddly, in light of the fact that they’ve turned out to be so well loved, the band was only ever intended to be a side-project. “It was almost by coincidence that it seemed to take off in such a big way, much to our delight,” reflects Nugent. “Although, we’ve all been involved with music for long enough to get a sense of when something is really working and striking a chord with an audience and that was pretty obvious from the beginning with The Pickers, so we just rolled with it really. We blinked and we were standing on the red-carpet at the ARIAs, then we blinked again and we were at Tamworth and then we blinked again and we were on the Gympie Muster, all of these big country music festivals. We’d all come from a more urban background with our music, so it was a great insight into that whole scene and how loyal and good those people are. It was strange though, because we’d sneak onto CMC Rocks the wherever, the Hunter or the Snowy, and there’d be real straight ahead country music in there, then there’d be this bohemian nod to guys like us and then Kasey Chambers and her crew would fill in the gaps in between.”
While the band’s members all have pretty damn illustrious careers in their own right (for instance, Nugent’s one half of Sweet Jean), they’re still getting kicks out of meeting personal heroes along the way. Take last year’s Byron Blues and Roots Festival for example. “Danny proudly came back to the group one day that we were playing there and said ‘I’ve just met Mavis Staples and Bonnie Raitt’,” Nugent laughs. “When we quizzed him about it though, it turned out that Mavis Staples and Bonnie Raitt were having a private conversation that Danny interrupted, and then Bonnie went into her dressing room and closed the door and Mavis walked off, but Danny was still as pleased as punch.”
BY MEG CRAWFORD
